Enzymes have been used within the detergent industry as part of washing formulations for many decades. Proteases are from a commercial perspective the most relevant enzyme in such formulations, but other enzymes including lipases, amylases, cellulases, hemicellulases or mixtures of enzymes are also often used. To improve the cost and/or the performance of enzymes there is an ongoing search for enzymes with altered properties, such as increased activity at low temperatures, increased stability, increased specific activity at a given pH, altered Ca2+ dependency, increased stability in the presence of other detergent ingredients (e.g. bleach, surfactants etc.) etc. For instance, one family of proteases, which is often used in detergents, are the subtilases. This family has previously been further grouped into 6 different sub-groups by Siezen R J and Leunissen J A M, 1997, Protein Science, 6, 501-523. One of these sub-groups is the Subtilisin family which includes subtilases such as BPN′, Subtilisin 309 (SAVINASE®, Novozymes A/S), Subtilisin Carlsberg (ALCALASE®, Novozymes A/S), Subtilisin S41 (a subtilase from the psychrophilic Antarctic Bacillus TA41, Davail S et al. 1994, The Journal of Biological Chemistry, 269(26), 99. 17448-17453) and Subtilisin S39 (a subtilase from the psychrophilic Antarctic Bacillus TA39, Narinx E et al. 1997, Protein Engineering, 10 (11), pp. 1271-1279). TY145 is a subtilase from Bacillus sp. TY145, NCIMB 40339, which was first described in WO 92/17577 (Novozymes A/S) and in the later application WO2004/067737 (Novozymes A/S) disclosing the three-dimensional structure and the use of protein engineering to alter functionality of a TY-145 subtilase.
Other enzymes, such as the alpha-amylases, have typically been alpha-amylases from B. licheniformis, also known as Termamyl. Similar to protease ongoing search for improvements, alpha-amylases are under development.
Detergent compositions have been described, but there is a continued need for improved detergent compositions, wherein the enzymes within the detergent compositions are not affected by other components of the detergent compositions, such as the bleaching system or chelators. Thus, it is an objective of the present invention to provide such detergent compositions.